A double-pointed wooden throwing stick from Schöningen, Germany:
results and new insights from a multianalytical study
Annemieke Milks cs 2023 PLoS ONE open access
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0287719
Schöningen (c 300 ka), yielded the earliest large-scale record of humanly-made wooden tools.
These include wooden spears & shorter double-pointed sticks, discovered in ass.x herbivores that were hunted & butchered along a lake-shore.
Wooden tools have not been systematically analysed to the same standard as other Palaeolithic technologies, e.g. lithic or bone tools.
Our multi-analytical study includes micro-CT scanning, 3D microscopy & Fourier transform IR spectroscopy, supporting a systematic technol. & taphonomic analysis, thus setting a new standard for wooden tool analysis.
In illustrating the biography of one of Schöningen’s double-pointed sticks, we demonstrate new human behaviours for this time period, incl. sophisticated wood-working techniques.
The hominins selected a spruce-branch, which they then debarked & shaped into an aerodynamic & ergonomic tool.
They likely seasoned the wood to avoid cracking & warping.
After a long period of use, it was probably lost while hunting, and was then rapidly buried in mud.
Taphonomic alterations include damage from trampling, fungal attack, root damage & compression.
Our detailed analysis shows:
mid-Pleistocene humans had a rich awareness of raw material properties,
they possessed sophisticated woodworking skills.
Alongside new detailed morphometrics of the object, an ethnographic review supports a primary function as a throwing-stick for hunting, indicating potential hunting strategies & social contexts incl. for communal hunts involving children.
The Schöningen throwing-sticks may have been used to strategically disadvantage larger ungulates, potentially from distances of up to 30 m.
They also demonstrate:
the hominins were technologically capable of capturing smaller fast prey & avian fauna, a behaviour evidenced at contemporaneous mid-Pleistocene archaeological sites.
Interesting paper:
"lake-shore... buried in mud...": for fishing cf. Nicholas Conard?
From my 2022 book p.222-223:
Die latere erectus-achtigen waren technisch al gevorderd.
In Schöningen 13 II-4 bij Hannover (400–300 ka) lagen in een ven,(fen) bij ‘kamp- of haardvuren’ zei Hartmut Thieme, zeker 15 paardenkadavers,(horse skeletons) 8 ‘mooi-uitgebalanceerde werpspiesen’ van taxus, een kort ‘steekwapen’ met
beiderzijds scherpe punten,(this paper) stenen werktuigen, en 3 zilversparren heften.
Maar Mareike Stahlschmidt zegt:
er was geen slachtpartij,(no butchering) er waren geen haardvuren,(no heards) alles was natuurlijk,(everything natural) ook de brandsporen, gespreid over jaren,(spread over years) afgezet in open water:
een meer(lake) met cypergrassen, vijvermossels, eend, zwaan en kraanvogel.
En volgens Nicholas Conard was het ‘steekwapen’ een werpstok waarmee je al wadend eenden, zwanen, misschien zelfs vissen kon doden.
In de bruinkoolmijn lagen resten van onder meer hond en vos, olifant, bosneushoorn, hert, paard, oeros, gewone en reuzenbevers, water- en andere mollen en spitsmuizen, amfibieën, reptielen, kevers, slakken en mossels, den, spar en els.
Paalgaten van paalhutten zijn er niet gevonden, emailde mij Jordi Serangeli: kenden ze al rietvlotten, veel veel primitiever dan bij moeras-arabieren?
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